The present disclosure relates to a refrigerator and an icemaker assembly of the refrigerator.
Generally, a refrigerator is a home appliance that stores food at a low temperature. The refrigerator has a freezing compartment and a refrigerating compartment to store the food stuffs in accordance with kinds of the food stuffs.
Recently, a variety of refrigerators having an icemaker has been released so as to hit the right chord with consumers.
FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a refrigerator according to the related art, and FIG. 2 is a cross-sectional view of a refrigerator door icemaker according to the related art. Referring to FIGS. 1 and 2, a refrigerator main body 10 is formed in a rectangular parallelepiped shape. An inner chamber of the main body 10 is divided into a refrigerating compartment 12 and a freezing compartment 14.
A plurality of shelves and drawers are provided in the refrigerating and freezing compartments 12 and 14. Cool air is selectively directed to the refrigerating and freezing compartments 12 and 14 so that the refrigerating and freezing compartments 12 and 14 can realize different food storage environments.
In order to selectively direct the cool air to the refrigerating and freezing compartments 12 and 14, a partition 20 is disposed at a rear-half of the refrigerator main body 10 spaced apart from an inner surface of a rear wall of the refrigerator main body 10. A heat exchange chamber 22 is defined between the inner surface of the rear wall of the refrigerator main body 10 and the partition 20. That is, the partition extends from an inner-upper end of the refrigerator main body 10 to an inner-lower end of the refrigerator main body 10 to define the heat exchange chamber 22. A heat exchanger 24 for generating the cool air and a fan motor 26 for forcedly circulating the cool air are installed in the heat exchange chamber 22.
That is, the cool air is generated in the heat exchange chamber 22 by the operation of the heat exchanger 24 and the generated cool air 26 is directed into the refrigerator main body 10 by the fan motor 26. Meanwhile, the partition 20 is provided at an upper portion with an air outlet 28 through which the cool air is discharged into the refrigerator main body 10 and toward an icemaker 40.
The refrigerating and freezing compartments 12 and 14 have respectively opened front portions. Refrigerator doors 30 are respectively provided on the opened front portions of the refrigerating and freezing compartments 12 and 14.
A dispenser 32 is provided on a front portion of the refrigerator door 30. The dispenser 32 allows a user to get ice or purified water without opening the refrigerating door 30.
The icemaker 40 is provided inside one of the refrigerator doors 30. The icemaker is for making and storing the ice. The icemaker 40 is generally provided on an inner portion of the door 30 for the freezing compartment 14.
Needless to say, the icemaker 40 may be provided on the door 30 for the refrigerating compartment 12. The dispenser 32 may be provided on the door 30 in which the icemaker 40 is provided.
The icemaker 40 includes an ice making unit 50 that is mounted on a rear surface of the door 30 to make ice, an ice conveying unit 60 that is disposed under the ice making unit 50 to store the ice and convey the ice to the dispenser 32, and a case 70 enclosing the ice making unit 50 and the ice conveying unit 60.
The ice making unit 50 includes an ice tray 52 for storing water used for making the ice and a bracket 54 on which the ice tray 52 is mounted. At this point, shielding member 56 is formed on the bracket 54 to partly shield a top of the ice tray 52.
The shielding member 56 confines cool air introduced into the icemaker 40 and directed toward the ice tray 52 within a portion around the ice tray 52 so that the water in the ice tray 52 can be more quickly frozen. The shielding member 56 is rounded to define a dome shape. That is, the shielding member 56 extends from the bracket 56 supporting both sides of the ice tray 52 toward an approximately top center of the ice tray 52. Therefore, the shielding member 56 is disposed above both sides of the ice tray 52 except for a central top of the ice tray 52.
Meanwhile, the ice tray 52 is rotatably mounted on the brackets 54 so that the ice made in the ice tray 52 can fall down by the rotation of the ice tray 52.
The ice conveying unit 60 is disposed under the ice making unit 50 to store the ice from the ice tray 52 and conveying the stored ice to the dispenser 32. The ice conveying unit 60 includes an ice conveying member 62 formed in a spiral shape and a motor 64 that is connected to the ice conveying member 62 to rotate the ice conveying member 62.
The ice making unit 50 and the ice conveying unit 60 are enclosed by the case 70. The case 70 is mounted on a rear surface of the door 30 to define a portion of the rear surface of the door 30.
As described above, the case 70 is configured to receive both the ice making unit 50 and the ice conveying unit 60. The case 70 is provided with a cool air inlet 72 through which the cool air is introduced into the icemaker 70.
At this point, the cool air inlet 72 is formed on an upper portion of a rear surface of the case 70 so that the cool air discharged through the cool air outlet 28 formed on the partition 20 can be directly introduced.
In order to effectively receive the cool air introduced through the cool air inlet 72, the ice making unit 50 is mounted on the rear surface of the door 30
However, the icemaker of the related art has the following limitations.
The cool air is introduced into the icemaker 40 through the cool air inlet 72 opened rearward. However, since the ice tray 52 is designed to be opened upward by the shielding member 56, the cool air introduced into the icemaker 40 cannot be fully directed to the ice tray 52. Therefore, the cool air cannot be fully utilized in the icemaker 40.
Therefore, the ice making performance is deteriorated and thus the ice making efficiency is deteriorated.
In order to compensate for the above limitation, the dome-shaped shielding member 56 is formed on the bracket 54 to confine the cool air within a portion around the top of the ice tray 52.
However, when the cool air is continuously confined within the portion around the top of the ice tray 52, a frost may be formed on a surface of the shielding member and the frost may keep growing by the repeated ice making processes.
Therefore, an amount of the cool air introduced into the ice tray 52 is reduced due to the growing of the frost.